


Absolution

by GhostySchnibibit



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Forgiveness, Gen, Light Angst, even though lucretia is the main focus of this fic she doesn't actually feature in it, implied/referenced PTSD, minor relationships tag for one mention of magnus/julia and two of blupjeans, posting this now before the finale josses it all lol, spoilers for stolen century (especially ep. 66), this is my first taz fic ever so i'm sorry if anyone seems ooc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-12-01 12:57:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11486868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostySchnibibit/pseuds/GhostySchnibibit
Summary: ab·so·lu·tionabsəˈl(y)o͞oSH(ə)n/noun: formal release from guilt, obligation, or punishment.synonyms: forgiveness, pardon, exonerationIn which each of the members of the IPRE crew have different ideas about forgiving Lucretia for what she did to them.





	Absolution

**Author's Note:**

> i had a lot of feelings after ep. 66 dropped and i spent two weeks writing them out. enjoy before griffin rips out our hearts and eats them tomorrow lol

Magnus doesn't forgive her instantly, but he's the first by a long shot. Right from the start he knows how torn she was about erasing everyone's memories, he knows how she always intended it to be temporary, and he knows how dearly she loves them all and how nothing could ever change that. She just… made a mistake. They _all_ made a mistake and it hurt this world almost irreparably. But she was the only one brave enough to try and fix it, even if she had to suffer for it alone all those years, and he deeply respects that. It’s that respect that makes it so easy for him to forgive her. And besides all that... it wasn't so bad, really, all that time without his memories. The life she carefully shaped for him in this world was a good one. He had a home and a calling and a family. He had a wife who he loved dearly, and one he never would have met if this none of this had ever happened. He doesn't blame her for how badly things went on that front because, well, none of that was her fault. She couldn't have known. Life is just… hard sometimes. There are more pressing things than sorting out the past. And even when there _aren’t_ anymore, when existence itself is _safe_ again for the first time in more than a century, he doesn’t care to dwell on it too much. He has his old friend back, his old _family_ back, and that’s all that matters.

* * *

Merle is the next to forgive her, but their friendship never reaches the heights it had before. He understands why she did it. He recognizes how warped and broken he and the others were becoming after the relics were made. He remembers the pain of watching the destruction his work had inflicted on the world bellow consuming him from within, the fear of wondering how close he was to the joyless existence he had once had no empathy for in John. He knows, deep down, that it was necessary. And so he forgives. But when all is said and done and he finally has time to think again, he can't deny the part of himself that resents having spent so long feeling insecure and useless because of the memories she took from him. He went for _so long_ believing that he had done nothing worthwhile in his life. He spent _years_ thinking that he was nothing more than a washed up holy man, a deadbeat who skipped out on his family, a sub par magic user and a general waste of space. And sure, it feels good to have his memories back and to have them reaffirm that his worries are unfounded; to know that he's not a failure, that he was, IS, a talented, valued member of a family that loves him and thinks he’s special. But the fact that he wasted so much time feeling so badly about himself still stings like a paper-cut, and looking her in the eyes some days all but slices him to ribbons.

* * *

Lup, once she’s finally, _finally_ resurrected, forgives her out of impulse first and out of necessity later. She knows that it was her own fault that she was… lost. She knows that the others couldn’t have known what happened to her, no one could have known, regardless of what her friend did. And she knows that she probably never stopped looking for her, even after all that time. But beyond all that, she’s so caught up in the rush of being _alive_ again, of seeing and hearing and FEELING! Actually _feeling_ again after so long of _nothing,_ makes her willing to forgive her on the spot just so she can get straight to fucking things up. And oh, BOY does she have some fun fucking things up. Despite all that, though… there’s still an occasional flash of anger, when everything calms down. When she learns about the hell her love went through trying to find her after he lost everything, every map and chart and tool he had, and how for a solid few years he was constantly afraid of being tracked down and maybe even _destroyed_ by the woman they both called family. When she learns about her other friends’ individual tragedies, about the lost loves and broken homes and shattered minds that were left in the wake of the mind wipe. When her brother finally breaks down and tells her why he’s been scared to cook for her since she’s come back, why he’s _fucking terrified that he’ll accidentally kill her_ because of something that happened out on the road while he was without her, without any of his family. All these little moments make her so… so _furious_ that she half regrets forgiving. But then they pass, and she forgives anyway, because she knows that forgiving her means forgiving _herself,_ too, for all the shit she could have prevented or fixed or helped if only she hadn’t left when she did. And she feels better for it, which is better than feeling nothing at all.

* * *

Barry is not prepared to forgive her, but he does against his better judgement. He doesn’t want to initially, not at all, not after spending years hardening his heart to her in self-preservation. But the world is actively dying around him, and his family needs him. More importantly, they need to be unified in this potentially final battle. He forgives her, just for the time being, and promises to himself that he’ll reevaluate the conditions of that forgiveness when reality itself isn’t in jeopardy. But the problem is, when he does reevaluate later on, he finds that he really… _does_ forgive her. Wholly and totally, he forgives her. He once looked at her and only saw someone who tore his family apart in the cruelest way possible, who sabotaged the only chance they had to fix everything. But the harder he looks now the more details he sees, and it scares him a little bit how much he can rationalize and even _relate_ to her motivations. She just wanted to make right in whatever way she could the terrible things that the relics had done, and by extension what he and the rest of their family had done. She was so desperate to free him from his mourning, to free them all from their self-inflicted torment that she felt she had to do something drastic. And he supposes that when it comes down to it he doesn't blame her for what she did so much as he wishes she could have clued him in. But, well, hindsight is twenty-twenty, and he figures that if she missed their family as much as he did over those long years then she's payed her penance. Because everything ended up alright, didn’t it? The planar system is finally at peace. His family is back together again. The love of his life is returned to him. What use is there in putting himself through anymore hell than he’s already been through for the sake of a grudge?

* * *

Davenport takes the longest to forgive her, and when he does it’s not without boundaries, not without limits. When he first comes to his senses again after years of almost constant static he honestly doesn’t know what to think of her. His first impulse is to be angry at her, horribly furiously _angry,_ and to hold that anger close. But then he looks up and sees her, along with the rest of his crewmates, his _family,_ almost paralyzed with fear as darkness descends, and a wave of protective instinct pushes that anger to the side. He never formally says that he forgives her, but he still fights alongside her and the rest of his crew as the sky falls around the seven of them, so everyone kind of assumes that he has. He decides that he’ll let that assumption stand once everything is calm again and his anger has cooled significantly. The extent of the damage done, however, only comes to the surface long after the fight is won, and it makes him rethink that decision. He can’t keep himself from crying when he thinks about the last few years too deeply. He can’t keep himself from waking up screaming in the middle of the night from dreaming about his time spent as an empty shell. Hell, he can’t keep himself from flinching slightly every time he hears his _own damn name._ And while it does help to have his family around him again, to have reminders everywhere of his once missing memory to ground him when he feels lost, he can’t shake his own bitterness. He just… he feels so _conflicted._ So torn between hating someone who robbed him of his agency, his sanity, his very _being,_ and still loving someone he knew as family for an entire century of life. And in the end it gets to a point where he’s at peace with that, and he lets his feelings stay torn. He can understand why she did it, and that she had a good idea but executed it in the worst way possible. He can forgive that much. He can let bygones be bygones and try to build new, happier memories over old hollow ones now that the danger has passed. But all the rest will haunt him until the day he dies, and he has a right not to forgive that.

* * *

Taako... Taako never forgives her. It doesn't matter any to him if it was always her plan to give them back what she took from them. It doesn't matter at all that she meant well, if her good intentions paved a road to her own personal hell. It doesn't even matter that his sister is back, that she has it in her newly revived heart to forgive. He puts up a front, an act. He's Taako from TV, gods damn it, he's a _good fucking actor._ It's no problem to pretend to make nice with her so they can get on with saving the world. And after the fact he keeps the act up, too, for old times’ sake, and for the sake of not hurting the people he’s only just gotten back. But behind closed doors, when he's alone and sure that no one can see, he can't let it go. He just _can’t._ Every time he sees his sister smile and hug the woman who ripped the very memory her away from him his blood boils. Every time his friends, his _family_ chat and talk and laugh with her and act as if the world didn't almost _end_ because her idea of fixing their mistakes was tearing their lives apart at the seams his hands shake and curl into fists. And every time he feels a rush of panic when someone he loves goes to take a bite of something he cooked for them because the happily ever after she crafted for him ended up profoundly _breaking_ him he silently curses her name. He knows what he’s doing is petty and callous, and probably bad for him in the long run. He doesn’t give a fuck.

**Author's Note:**

> woohoo, first ever taz fic and first work posted to this account! i've got a bunch of other fics in the works/finished fics i haven't had the courage to post yet that i want to put here eventually, but this one went up first because it was the only one that could be considered time sensitive (aka likely to be made moot by canon events once the next episode goes up). 
> 
> if you liked this then please feel free to leave kudos/comments, and thanks for reading! ^u^


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